


The Iraqi Nights

by thispagealone



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-30
Updated: 2012-04-30
Packaged: 2017-11-04 15:14:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/395256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thispagealone/pseuds/thispagealone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of stories, or missing moments, The Arabian Nights style. Set during Generation Kill (miniseries!verse)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Iraqi Nights

**Author's Note:**

> Shit homes! This started as a drabble after the nth rewatch... god, I hope you enjoy it

Outside of Baghdad. The POG camp.

Walt is on watch, when Evan goes to sit next to him.

“You okay, Walt?”

“Yeah… I think eating with the guys today put things back into perspective.”

“You mean that Ray’s inability to eat made you laugh, and now you feel better?” He asked with a smirk. Walt snorted.

“Yeah, you fucker. That’s exactly what I meant.”

“So, how did you and Person meet anyway?”

Walt smiles and steals a glance behind him, where Ray is huddled in his grave, finally quiet and asleep.

“I will tell you, Reporter. But you have to promise you won’t write it down.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s got nothing to do with the invasion and it’s nobody’s fucking business, that’s why.”

Wright feels chastised for a moment. Walt smiles.

“Don’t make that face, Reporter. I’m gonna tell you, okay? I just don’t want my personal good memories all over Rolling Stone, that’s all.”

~

The first time Walt saw Ray was during one of his more theory-heavy lessons, during his training. Recon Marines are independent from all other branches of the Corps, so they need to be able to take care of all their equipment. It’s difficult to be _swift, silent_ and _deadly_ , if you have to yell your position because your radio broke down. That’s how Walt found himself in a classroom with another dozen bored Recon Marines, waiting for their instructor to finally show up.

The class was empty when they entered, except for a whiteboard with “HOW TO UNFUCK YOUR COMMS” written in black marker and a Marine in service uniform, mounting guard on one side of the door. Walt didn’t pay him much attention, if not to notice how perfectly motionless he was, as if he thought that if he remained still enough, he’d become one with the wall behind him – that was his first clue that something wasn’t right. Ten minutes later their instructor was still M.I.A. and his “classmates” were starting to get restless. The first to acknowledge the marine at the door was the man behind him.

“Who do you think that skinny fucker is?” He asked the man at his right.

“Fucked if I know. What did he do to end up guarding us?” The other countered.

“Let’s see if I can make him move.” The first one started to make paper balls from his notebook, tossing them towards the man at the door. He didn’t even flinch. Then again, none of them came even close to hitting him. At that point the rest of the class had cottoned on to what was happening, with mixed reactions: some laughed, others rolled their eyes, a couple looked at the marine speculatively, like Walt.

Eventually, one of the balls seemed to have locked on the target – if not for the fact that the marine’s hand came up incredibly fast (like, blink-and-you-miss-it fast) and snatched the paper in-flight. He slowly turned his head to finally look at them, revealing deep brown eyes and a dimpled smile.

“I sure hope you’re good at something else, ‘cause your aim is seriously shit, homes! It’s almost depressing to see how things haven’t changed from when I took this course. Ah, those were the days…”

Suddenly, his whole body went from deathly still to a state of perpetual motion. He walked to the front of the class, slowly, ignoring the snorts of amusement.

“Welcome to How To Unfuck Your Comms, children. I will show you the basics of how to take care of your radio equipment. Those of you who show promise will learn more advanced shit with me and Corporal Carisalez, who can fix anything, from a screen door to a broken heart. Or so he keeps saying. The others can go find their own niche, fuck me if I care. Any questions?”

Walt raised his hand. The man nodded for him to speak.

“Who are you, sir?”

He smiled like Walt had just done something right. He walked the couple steps that separated him from his desk.

“That depends, Sunshine. First of all, I’m nobody’s “sir”. Unless there’s some kinky shit going on.” He waggled his eyebrows in the most ridiculous way. Walt bit back a laugh. “That out of the way, I’m either your pal Ray, if you’re a good boy or, if you’re that fucker who is making faces behind my back and hasn’t noticed there’s a window right in front of me, I’m Corporal Person, a fucking Recon Marine who will fuck your shit up. Seriously, man!” He turned around to face the surprised marine. “Are you sure you’re Recon material? Even a whiskey tango motherfucker like you should know that glass is a reflecting surface… Yes, that means I can actually see you.”

“Who the fuck does this fucker think he is?” Asked someone in a whisper.

“I’m the best fucking R.T.O. in the business, that’s who! Know what that means? No? Well, too fucking bad for you.”

He turned to wink at Walt, then strode back to the front of the class, asking cheerfully,

“So! Who wants to know what to do when water gets inside your radio?”

Walt had no fucking chance – he was smitten.

~

“Wait! He started calling you ‘Sunshine’ the very first time you met?” Wright looks like he needs a moment to regroup.

“He sure did!”

“Doesn’t it bother you?”

“Listen, Ray has a name for everybody. He calls Trombley ‘Psycho’ and Brad ‘Iceprincess’ – behind his back, of course. Hell, who do you think gave you all those nicknames? I’d say ‘Sunshine’, or even ‘Puppy’, are pretty tame, don’t you think? It’s just how he shows affection. It’s when he calls me Walt that I worry.”

“By the way, why _does_ he call you ‘Puppy’?”

Walt laughed.

~

“You gotta be fucking kidding me! Humvees, Brad? Really?! Shit, homes, they look like a little wind will do them over. Are you sure they’re supposed to go to war? Hell, my mother’s trailer looks more solid than one of those! Dirty’s gonna pee himself.”

Brad turned to face Nate.

“I hope you know, sir, how much it pains me to be caught agreeing with Cpl. Person.”

Nate smiled openly for a moment, then he was gone, probably to bother someone about getting them supplies. Walt didn’t care.

“I want the .50-cal!” He said excitedly.

“Aaww! I don’t like the Mark-19!” Lamented Garza.

“Walt, Garza is better on the .50-cal.” Objected Brad. Walt pouted pitifully and shamelessly. Ray snorted.

“Come on, dad! Let the kid have his fun.” He enticed, pointing at Walt. “Look at him! Would you really deny that puppy-face anything?” Brad shook his head, but left Walt where he was. “I didn’t think so.”

Walt jumped on Ray and ran his tongue from his jaw to his temple.

“Fuck, Walter! That’s disgusting! Bad puppy!”

“Thank you, mommy!”

~

At this point Evan is laughing so hard he’s risking to wake the others up.

“Shut up, man! Brad’ll kill me if I wake Ray up! Do you know how long it takes for him to come down from his Ripped Fuel high?”

“Sorry! I’m sorry. I’ll keep it down. Tell me another story.”

“Damn, Reporter! You’re worse than a kid.”

“I can’t sleep. And you’re good company.”

“Fine.” Walt sighs. “I’ll tell you about when we got to Camp Mathilda, then. Remember that, by that time, we’d already been living in each other’s pockets for a long ass time…”

“Walt.” Interrupts Colbert at that moment. “Get some shut-eye. I’m taking over watch.”

“Thanks, Brad. Sorry, Rolling Stone. Maybe some other time, yeah?”

“Yeah. Thank you, Hasser. Goodnight.”

“Why aren’t you sleeping, Reporter?” Asks Brad, leaning on the Humvee, next to where Evan is sitting.

“Don’t know. Not sleepy, I guess. Walt was telling me stories.”

“Stories? Like what?”

“Like when he and Ray met, or when you got the Humvees.”

“Nice. I don’t even know how they met.” He smiles. “Are you gonna write about the momentous occasion of Ray and Sunshine’s first meeting? It makes for a good pun, if nothing else.”

“Can’t. Walt forbade it.”

“Why?”

“It is, and I quote, ‘nobody’s fucking business’. He told me because I’m like a kid who can’t sleep and wants a story, apparently.”

Brad chuckles lightly, sending a fond look to Walt, who’s now sleeping huddled in the grave next to Ray’s. They’re both silent for a while, Brad watching his sector and Evan lightly dozing against a tire.

“What story was he gonna tell you when I got here?”

Evan startles at Brad’s voice, suddenly loud next to him, where the other man is now sitting. It takes a moment for him to engage the brain.

“Oh. He was going to tell me some story about when you guys were at Mathilda. Before I arrived.”

“I could tell you a story about that.”

“Really?”

“Yep. If the agreement is still that you don’t publish it.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s nobody’s fucking business, Reporter.” Brad answers with a laugh. Evan smirks and promises to keep it to himself. Brad sighs and makes himself comfortable.

~

After pitching their own tent, Bravo Two and Three had begun negotiating their personal quarters inside it. Ray, ignoring the rest of the guys, turned left and occupied the space nearest to the entrance. Rudy smiled and did the same on the right, nodding approvingly. Brad snorted and gestured for Trombley to take the spot next to Ray’s.

“Uh-uh. I’m not sleeping there.” Trombley said, not leaving space for discussion. “He kicks when he’s dreaming.”

Ray rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to  reply with something undoubtedly very offensive, or with an offer to kick him when he was awake, too. Then Walt shoved past Trombley and dropped his things next to him.

“I’ll sleep here.” He said simply. Trombley shrugged and took the next spot, leaving Brad to smile at Walt and take the space immediately following. The rest of the men were already unrolling their sleeping bags.

It was a couple of nights later that Brad saw for himself how right Trombley had been. He was talking with Nate just inside the entrance, both very quiet as not to wake the men, when Ray started moving in his sleep. He got so agitated that he rolled on his front, half out of the edge of his sleeping bag. Brad was about to wake him up, when Walt stretched out his left arm and leg and pinned Ray underneath himself. In less than fifteen seconds Ray had settled. Neither of them had woken up.

“Why wasn’t I aware that they are a sniper team?” Nate said, his head cocked to one side.

“Because they aren’t!” Hissed Brad.

“Well, I think they might be training in their free time.” His right eyebrow raised a bit. “They just synchronized their breathing in their sleep, Brad.” He chuckled. Brad allowed himself a smirk.

“Look at them.” He crooned. “Aren’t they cute?” Nate shook his head, but he was still smiling.

“Yeah, your kids are really cute, Colbert. Like two cuddling feral wolves.” Brad snorted, pushing Nate’s shoulder gently with his own.

“Wolves can be cute, though, sir.”

“Go get some sleep, too, Brad. You’re spouting nonsense.”

“I shall at once. After I make sure you do the same, sir.”

“I already have one mother-henning Sergeant, Brad.” Grumbled Nate. “I thought you were on my corner.” Brad smiled openly and squeezed his arm for a moment.

“Goodnight, Nate.”

“Night, Brad.”

“Give a kiss to Gunny for me!”

“Smartass…” Nate mumbled, leaving the tent.

~

“That _was_ cute.” Evan remarks with a smile, after hearing Brad’s (oddly affectionate) story. Brad smiles and stands up again.

“Now sleep. I have to do a sweep of the perimeter and check on the others.”

Contrary to popular belief, Evan thinks, as he lies back in his hole, he doesn’t write everything that he sees when he walks among the men. On the contrary, there are a lot of things he deems too personal or not relevant to his purpose, but that he cannot help but witness. Like when he saw Brad approach Rudy, only hours after Pappy was gone, and sit next to him with a simple “Brother, do you need a friend?”, pulling from him the first smile in as many hours.

Or the night after Al Muwaffaqiyah, when he was struggling to fall asleep (again) and he saw Brad move toward Nate with a contrite expression on his face. (Really, do you expect him to turn away from something like that? He _is_ a reporter, and he can be quiet and still, when he tries).

“A word, sir?” Brad had asked, without the usual assuredness that he _would_ be heard.

“Of course, Brad.” Nate sighed, sitting sideways on his seat. “Is there any problem with your men?”

“No, sir. I wanted to apologize.”

“Apologize? For what?” To his credit, Nate sounded sincerely baffled.

“We all know about your _thing_ with Encino Man and Casey Kasem…”

“Brad. Names.” Nate interrupted sternly.

“They’re secret code names, sir. This is a covert operation.” Brad explained with a straight face. Nate snorted. “As I was saying, we all know about it, and about the pains you go through not to let the shit roll downhill too fast. I’m really sorry I was so flippant, yesterday. When I said you were astute, sir.” He added, as an afterthought.

From his fake-asleep position in front of them, Evan saw Nate smile mischievously.

“You mean I’m not?”

“What?” Brad looked perplexed.

“Astute.”

“Shut up, LT!” They both laughed, then Nate seemed to be lost in thought.

“ _This is my Sergeant_.” Nate quoted in a quiet voice. “ _There are many like him, but this one is mine. My Sergeant is my best friend. My Sergeant is my life. I must obey him as I obey my wife. Without me, my Sergeant is lucky. Without my Sergeant, I am useless_.”

They were both silent for a long moment. Brad, contemplating the words. Nate, letting them sink in.

“When I became Lieutenant,” he continued, “I told myself that I would always live by those words. I have been doing a shitty job of it, haven’t I?” Brad kept looking at him intensely. “I can’t promise you that I won’t say or do other stupid things, since I’m doing the best I can with what is handed to me.” Brad scoffed contemptuously at their CO’s incompetence. “And once we’re back home, I’ll probably have a shitload of regrets about what I did here. But this I will never regret: having Mike next to me every step of the way, or always believing that my Team Leaders would be able to carry out every impossible task thrust upon them. But most of all, Brad, I’ll never regret trusting you to be my Point Man. There is nobody else in this world I have more faith in, you can be assured of that. So, yeah, what I’m probably trying to say is, apology accepted.”

Brad sucked in a large breath of air and held it in, while Nate observed his reaction carefully. After a minute, he let it out slowly.

“Thank you, sir.” He finally said, in a very quiet voice. Nate smiled brilliantly and stood up, making his way towards the back of the truck. Brad’s voice stopped him mid-step. “Nate?”

“Yes?”

“I wouldn’t be lucky, without you.” And he walked away, leaving a gaping LT behind.

From then on, though, things had seemed less tense between the two, and more like Evan had observed them when he first entered the platoon.

Oh, there’s also what he overheard between Brad and Rudy a couple of days ago, that made him smile like a fool, and think that the two toughest warriors he had ever met, were in reality two gossiping adolescent girls.

~

“Brad! Wake up, brother!” Evan was woken by Rudy whisper-yelling at Brad, in the grave next to his. Team two’s TL was sitting on the edge of the hole, shaking and kicking the Iceman awake. Evan heard, from the turret, where he was cleaning the M-19, Walt snicker at the scene. Finally, Brad seemed to have had enough of the other man’s shenanigans and sat up with a remarkable, albeit muffled, roar.

“What the fuck, Rudy?! Is there anyone in this fucked up place, who will let me have more than fifty consecutive minutes of sleep?”

“Fuck your sleep!” Brad’s eyebrows raised impressively fast at Rudy’s unprecedented impatience. “I’m afraid we’re gonna lose the LT!”

“What?!”

“He just antagonized Griego, Brad. But in a really, really big way. In front of my whole team, too. Tomorrow morning it’ll be already all over the platoon. If not the company. Hell, Brad, I wouldn’t be surprised it Alpha heard about it before the afternoon.”

“Rudy, fucking breathe. You’re rambling.”

“Sorry, my brother. It’s been a strange night.”

“It’s alright. Now tell me _exactly_ what happened. Don’t leave anything out.”

And that’s when Evan thought smugly, “I was right. They’re totally the biggest gossips I know. Stoic warriors, my ass!”. He kept perfectly still (from the corner of his eye, he saw Walt trying to make himself as inconspicuous as possible, too), watching as Brad gathered his knees towards himself, making room for Rudy to sit inside the grave, in the same position, in front of him.

“There’s a blown up T-72 somewhere out there,” Rudy started to say, “and Gunny tried to send out my team to inspect it, even if I’m the only one who is currently able to walk, let alone go on a mission. He was really forceful, so Steven offered to go, even if his team is barely healthier than mine.”

“Shit, Rudy!” Interrupted Brad. “Why the fuck didn’t you wake us up? None of us is sick, yet.”

“Not the point, Brad. Plus, you guys need to sleep, too. You’re already pulling double watch. The point is the LT walked up to us, asking me where team three was. I tried to hint about the tank, but Gunny told him we were covering his ass, and what did it look like that an officer didn’t have situational awareness?”

“He said that? Shit! What did the LT say?”

“He said that from where he was standing, it looked like, and I quote, ‘an incompetent moron climbing up the asshole of his company commander by inventing a bullshit mission’.” Brad’s guffaws covered Evan and Walt’s snorts.

“Then what?”

“Then he asked if Gunny had asked him about sending his men out and he answered that he had. Turns out, the LT hadn’t slept for 36 hours and he thought that he was dreaming. The moron didn’t even check to see if he was actually awake.”

“I bet he didn’t…” Commented the other man, morosely.

“So Fick told him to get out of there and to never again mess with his platoon.”

“Hoo-rah.”

“There’s even more. The piece of shit ass-licker (“that’s the meanest thing I’ve ever heard you say, Rude”) had the nerve to say that he was only trying to cover for him, since he knows how he’s suspect with battalion.”

“Shit, is it really so bad?”

“Yeah, brother! Did you think I was messing around when I told you I was afraid we were gonna lose the LT? And wait ‘til I tell you what he said!”

“What did he say?” At that point, unbeknownst to the two gossiping men, Evan, Walt and Ray were on the edge of their seats with anticipation.

“He said, and I quote again verbatim, ‘Fuck that. You can fuck with me all you want but do not, I repeat, do not fuck with my men. I'm putting it down, gunny. You picking it up?’ He was very angry, too, brother. I’ve never seen him lose his cool like that. Gunny ran back to Encino Man real fast. I think Chafin almost pissed himself from sheer delight. Well, it could have been he’s sick, too.”

“That was a very stupid thing to do, my friend.”

“Fuck that, Iceman. The LT was a real superhero!”

“I’m not disagreeing with you. Hell, it’s not even the first time I want to kiss the man.” Rudy chuckled.

“And y’all say _I’m_ gay.”

“Whatever man. I’d make an exception for that man, I swear. The point is, he’s in deep shit. He’s in shit so deep we’ll have to pull a deep diving mission to get him out, you read me?”

“Yeah, man… That’s why I came here. I wanted to hear what you think we should do.”

Brad unfolded himself from his cramped position.

“For now we find ways to let him know we’ve got his six without being too obvious, because it pisses him off. He thinks he’s the only one who has the right to be a protective asshole.”

“Roger that, my brother. Where are you going now?”

“To speak to Mike. He needs to know that things have gotten real bad. He’s Nate’s only official shield in all this clusterfuck. Sometimes it’s useful, being a nag.”

When they were far enough from the Humvee, Ray sprung up and climbed on top of it to sit in front of Walt.

“Shit, homes, LT is the real Captain America! And I mean it in the best of ways, not like you-know-who.”

“Yeah… Do you think he’s gonna be in real trouble for this? I mean, I know that he’s Casey Kasem’s superior, but the man is a real bastard. He’s gonna make his life impossible.”

“I know… That majorly sucks, dude.” Walt laughed out loud. “What?”

“You just sounded like Meesh! Dude.” He mimicked Meesh’s accent. Ray laughed with him.

“Come on, Sunshine, go get some sleep. I’m awake anyway, might as well do something productive.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, now beat it!” He said, tousling Walt’s hair, as he took off his cover. Walt smiled at him brilliantly, jumping off the Humvee and going to sleep in Brad’s vacated grave.

“Goodnight, Ray.” He mumbled through a yawn.

“Goodnight, Walter. Sleep tight, don’t let the Hajis bite.”

“Fuck you, Ray.”

“Love you too, darling. Now go the fuck to sleep!”

~

The following nights are a right mess, so Evan doesn’t hear any new ‘secret stories’ until they reach the abandoned cigarette factory in Baghdad. They’re there for less than three hours, when Ray and Rudy come to find him.

“Come on, Reporter! Let’s go recon this shit out!” Ray says cheerily. Rudy shakes his head with a smile at the man’s unfailing good humor.

“Do you ever get tired, brother?”

“Eh! Take advantage of it while it lasts. LT took away my Ripped Fuel.” Evan and Rudy hiss in sympathy. “I know, right? Total bullshit.”

They are working their way through the complex, when they hear a singing voice, coming from further down the corridor. Rudy makes a series of hand-gestures that leave Evan baffled. He turns to Ray, who smirks and brings a finger to his lips and waves for him to follow.

“Oh! Shut up and follow me!” He thinks with relief. “Why didn’t he just do that?”

From the wide smile on his face, Ray must have read his thoughts. They walk silently for a couple minutes, then flatten themselves against the wall, behind the corner from which comes the voice. They’re all surprised at how good the man is. Nobody knew they had another talent in the platoon, apart from Walt. Rudy’s about to look past the corner, when Ray plants his hands on their chests to stop them.

“Is that the LT?” He whispers, being careful not to be overheard. Evan’s eyes widen and he can see Rudy smile giddily, nodding. “Man, he’s fucking good!”

They nod emphatically, gesturing for him to shut up so they can hear the other man sing. After a couple minutes, Rudy frowns minutely and sticks his head out. They see him jump back and gesture wildly for them to run. They have barely enough time to hide in an empty room, before Nate emerges where they were hidden, missing them only just. They listen as he passes by, still singing, and slide down the wall with a sigh.

“That was close.” Breathes Evan. Unsurprisingly, Ray is the first to jump up again.

“Homes! The LT sings like an angel!” He exclaims cheerfully. “He’s almost as good as Walt! If Brad knew…”

“Oh, I think he’ll know very soon.” Laughs Evan.

“Why?” Asks Rudy.

“Do you really think Ray will be able to shut up about this?”

“Oh, no! Ray!” He grabs the other man’s shoulders in his gigantic hands. “You can’t tell anyone!”

“What?! But why? Brad…”

“Okay, you can tell Brad. And Walt.” He amends at Ray’s massive pout. “But no more, Ray! I don’t think the LT meant for us to spy on him in one of the only moments of relax he has, do you? He’s still our only competent CO and deserves all the respect he can get.”

“Fine!” Ray mumbles.

“This stands for you, too.” He points to Evan. “It stays between us. You won’t write it.”

“Okay.” Evan sighs. “If you keep telling me not to write things, my articles will be ten words long, by the time I write them.” Ray snorts and gives him a hand to stand up.

“Don’t whine, Reporter. We gave you plenty of things to write about. Who told you not to write their stories, anyway?”

“Walt and Brad, mostly.”

“Why?” They’re almost back to base. They can see Nate speaking to Brad. “What were these stories about?”

“You, generally.” Ray’s eyebrows shoot up. “And apparently they’re nobody’s fucking business.”

“What stories? Tell me!” Evan looks at Rudy and both smirk.

“Sorry, Ray. I don’t have permission to repeat them.”

Ray keeps bugging him for the rest of the afternoon. He’s proud of the fact that he doesn’t give in.

 

That night, while he’s organizing his notes, it’s surprisingly Rudy who comes to sit next to him.

“So, stories, um?” He asks with a smile. “Why?”

“I couldn’t sleep and Walt kept me company. Then Brad woke up for his watch and told me one story about Ray and Walt at Camp Mathilda.”

“Sounds almost like _Arabian Nights_.” Rudy remarks. “Apart from the fact that you’re obviously not threatening to kill them if they don’t give you a tale each night.”

“I think that they’d kill me before I finished the sentence, to be honest with you.” Rudy laughs at his comment, nodding.

“That’s true, my friend. Do you want me to tell you a story about Ray and Walt, too?”

“Do I have to keep it secret, too?”

“Of course.”

“Fine.” He sighs. “Let’s hear it, then.”

“You’re a good man, Reporter.” Rudy lies down on the concrete floor, hands behind his head. “You must have noticed that our two favorite kids are quite smaller than the majority of the guys in the company. As you can imagine there was a bit of hazing, at the start…”

~

Rudy liked his new platoon. Most of the guys he already knew from their tour in Afghanistan, but there were some new faces, too. A couple of them looked really young. He knew that the hazing and the borderline violent behavior were nothing out of the norm, but he didn’t have to like it, most of all if it was against his friends. He knew that Ray could be a pain in the ass, and Walt was one of the ‘new guys’, but it was unfair to always go against them only because they looked smaller than the others. They were Recon Marines just as much as the biggest guy. They didn’t seem to mind much, Ray mostly laughed in their faces, and Walt smiled sweetly and moved on, but he knew what those two little fuckers were capable of.

One evening, still at Pendleton waiting for their orders, Rudy took the opportunity of a series of sparring matches to show the others something special.

“Ray, brother! Why don’t you and Walt show us something nice?” He suggested sweetly. Ray gave him a knowing look and hauled Walt to the sparring mat in the center. Since it was Rudy’s kingdom, basically, no one dared to object. Rudy caught Brad’s eye, who smirked at him, shaking his head.

“What do you want us to do, Rude?” Asked Ray pleasantly.

“Take him for a dance, what do you think?” Answered one of the men, snidely. The others snickered.

“Oh, you want us to dance?” Walt’s eyes were very big and innocent. “Okay.”

They took position and started with an impressive capoeira routine, to some people’s astonishment. After a couple of minutes Rudy called,

“Karate!”

They made the transition seamlessly, same as for jiu-jitsu, kick boxing, krav maga and ending with an extremely violent free hand to hand. When Rudy called for an end, they stepped away from each other without a hitch, perfectly in control. The training room was completely silent.

“I hope this was a lesson for all.” Said Rudy with a pointed look. A glance at Brad and Garza showed them silently laughing their asses off.

“We’re fucking Recon Marines, homes!” Walt delivered the line perfectly replicating Ray’s tone of voice. It was enough to make everyone burst out laughing.

~

“…and from that day, nobody underestimated our little kids anymore. Well, not more than usual, anyway.”

Evan looks down at the gentle giant’s serene smile and notices he’s smiling, too. Leave it to Rudy to tell a story that’s all about martial arts.

“Thank you, Rudy. That’s was an awesome story.”

“You’re welcome, brother.” He springs up on his feet, light as a butterfly. “Now I have to go look after my own kids. I’ll see you later.”

“Bye, Rudy.”

 

When Evan leaves, he has quite a lot of material for his articles, and maybe for a book, too. What he never tells a soul is that he has enough stories he’s promised never to tell to write another one. He’ll leave them back in the desert. They don’t belong where he’s going…

~

…what he doesn’t know, is that there are a lot of other stories to tell.

Garza could have told him that Walt became their friend, when he and Ray improvised a synchronized swimming routine during his first deep diving exercise with the team, almost making him drown. Brad wasn’t the happiest of campers, but Walt was theirs from then on.

Lilley could have shown him the footage he didn’t cut into his film, where he had recorded a lot of ‘sweet’ moments, and a lot of stupid ideas brought to life, and many examples of true friendship, too.

Rudy could have told him how many times he asked Ray to forgive him, after the incident during the football match, and how every time Ray had hugged him and told him, “Don’t sweat it, brother. We’re all a bit on edge. I know you love me.” Making him smile each time (and maybe being the reason why he continued to apologize).

And Ray, Ray could have told him how he was there when Brad and Nate kissed for the first time. Not that he’d intended to, or that they saw him (he hoped). He was looking for Walt, to be honest, when he came upon his two immediate superiors fighting in a corridor.

“With all due respect, sir, this is bullshit!” Brad was almost shouting, to Ray’s everlasting surprise. What was so severe as to make the Iceman lose his cool?

“Brad, please.” Nate sighed, raking a hand through his short hair. “We’ve already been through this. I don’t want my men to have problems because of me.”

“Well, good. Since you’re in some shit because of us.”

“That’s not true.”

“You’ve only done whatever it is you did to protect us.”

“I disobeyed direct orders, Brad. And didn’t tell my CO his protocols were wrong on purpose. I’m a Marine Officer, Brad. And we obey orders. That’s some serious shit.”

Ray was speechless. He knew the LT was having some trouble, but he didn’t imagine that it could be so serious. What Nate described was basis for court. He was with Brad on that one. Brad, who was still shouting and who’d have probably been pulling his hair out, if he had any long enough.

“Brad.” Nate said in a soft voice, taking hold of Brad’s wrists. “I kept you all alive. That’s all I wanted to do. The rest honestly doesn’t matter to me.”

“Well, it matters to me.” Brad grumbled, but he didn’t take his hands back.

“Why?” Nate asked, a bit exasperatedly, in Ray’s opinion. He should know, he’d heard that tone of voice in multiple occasions.

Brad didn’t answer, not with words anyway. He used Nate’s hold on his wrists to pull the other man towards himself, then he grabbed his face in his hands and proceeded to kiss him stupid. Ray was sure that that was Brad’s intension, because a kiss like that could make the cleverest person into an idiot, he was sure.

“Get some!” He whispered to himself, waiting to leave until he saw the LT bring his hands to the nape of Brad’s neck and press him against the wall forcefully. Brad was a moaner, who’d have thought. He walked back to the humvee, snickering, with a muttered “Kinky!” and a smile.

(“It matters because I want to keep you safe, too. Because you don’t get what it means that I trust you with absolute certainty. Because I want everyone to see how fucking special you are, in this goddamn madness.” Is the part Ray didn’t ear, while walking away.)

Or they could have told him how seeing Poke’s daughter run to him and jump into his arms made a whole company of tough Marines a bit teary.

Walt could have explained why, after merely two weeks of leave at home, he was bored out of his mind and went back to Oceanside. Only to find Ray already there. They then proceeded to fuck each other’s brains out for the rest of their leave.

What they _did_ tell him was that they liked his articles and his book. That he wasn’t as bad a reporter as they’d expected. And that, yes, they actually considered him a friend. Of course, two minutes later they were telling each other the most idiotic things they’d seen him do. Nate took great relish in describing his serpentine run.

They were the best stories he’d ever heard.

Obviously, there were many more. Honestly, though, they’re none of your fucking business.


End file.
